Into the (Unexpectedly Sophisticated) Mind of Luffy
by 31esser
Summary: Luffy, the captain of Straw Hat pirates we fans and audience know as idiotic, innocent and naive yet strong and dependable. However, isn't that too good to be true? What if it was just a very good act to cover his calculative and well-thought actions? No one would suspect him when he acts like a fool the next moment. Welcome, to the unveiling of the true (dark) Luffy.
1. Chapter 1

**Episode 1: Waking up from the barrel**

**AN: I'm not exactly going to follow a chronological order - it just seemed logical to explore the possibility of Luffy being manipulative or shrewd from the beginning and it really seemed possible (haha).**

* * *

"Heave-ho." The strained voices of the men struggling to haul a large barrel out of the sea rang out.

"Man this is heavy, it's a wine barrel isn't it?" A masculine voice said as he pulled on the rope attached to the barrel.

A boy who was in the barrel rubbed his eyes from sleep and yawned quietly, waking up upon the vertical jerks of his barrel.

"Trouble! It's a pirate ship!" The watchman called out, sounding the alarm.

Ah, this is great, not only did I get rescued, more pirates are also in the vicinity! This going to be so fun! The boy in hiding mused.

He tensed as the barrel was carelessly thrown to the ground as the men scrambled to make preparations for the oncoming attack, fortunately the container did not break, exposing his prone form in the middle on the deck.

Instead, the ship was under fire as it swayed erratically due to the barrage of cannon fire, and thus the barrel was thrown violently around the ship, banging into walls, furniture and down the stairs.

He lost all sense of orientation as the world spun around him, almost knocking him out cold.

* * *

A particularly violent impact that rocked the ship put him immediately on the alert. Moments later, someone approached, murmuring under his breath and rolled his barrel around.

He got up to pay attention as he heard more voices voting to open the barrel. Here's my chance.

He crouched and got ready as he listened in.

"Well, just wait, I'm gonna smash the barrel open right now."

Snickered inwardly at how this will play out, thought of his opening line as he adjusted his body within the confined space

There was a sound of something moving through the air in fast speed and then a rough sounding voice grunted. The impish boy started counting down.

"Hrmmm..." Three.

"Rrghhhh..." Two.

"Raaaahh!" One!

He exclaimed with a loud voice as he quickly shot up with both fists clenched outwards, angled at where he heard the slob who was going to bash his barrel in "Ah! What a great nap!"

With a loud crunching sound, his right fist collided with the lower jaw of the unknowing victim and sent him flying, his plan was a complete success as he effectively knocked out his intended target. He turned with an innocent poker face towards the sound of a man crashing to the ground.

He stared at the unconsciousness man, "Huh? What's with him?" the two lackeys in front of him were shocked to the core as the supposed 'waking up yawn' had unintentionally put their huge leader to sleep. What was more surprising was that it was a lanky youth that had the air of… Nothing threatening.

Their shock was interrupted by the youth's voice, "Who are you guys?"

"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?" They roared in outrage at the nonchalant question.

"That person's gonna catch a cold if he sleeps there." The young man continued.

"You're the one who did that..." They started tearing up at the ridiculousness of the situation.

One of them raised his sword to him, "You bastard, do you intend to screw with us knowing we are pirates?" he threatened with a low voice.

But he missed his moment as the target has already turned around and started asking for food. Further enraged by his lack of attention, all caution was thrown to the wind as they aimed for an overhead killing strike.

"DIE!"

The Straw-hat smirked from the corner of his mouth as his ruse had worked successfully, the shadow of his namesake covered his eyes as he turned to face their attacks.

He waited for the flimsy metals they were using as swords and in one smooth motion, struck at their rustiest point and broke them, the top halves dug into the ceiling above.

He smirked inwardly, his plan had gone perfectly.

He had heard four different voices talking when in the barrel, three had walked into the first guy while he was rolling the barrel somewhere, hearing the din outside as a fight broke out, the first guy must either be either an important guy that can be missed during the fight or a weak one that came over here to avoid the fighting.

He felt a plan coming into his mind as he calculated their positions and assessed their strength from what he can feel and hear from the barrel. He made sure to knock out the strongest among them in one hit to avoid a scuffle.

After that came the other two, he turned to where the weakest of them were supposed to be and started engaging him in a nonchalant conversation, riling up the two lackeys and putting their guard down before breaking their weapons and thus, fighting spirits.

"W-who the hell are you?" They were scared shitless and stammered as they sank to their knees at the unexplainable scene before their eyes.

"Me? My name is Monkey D. Luffy. Nice to meet'cha."

**~ To be Continued ~**

**AN: Please feel free to leave comments, suggestions or ideas. Drop a note on what scene you want most to be shown here! Interpreted for good or worse! (most probably worse XD)**

**Next up: 'Episode 0: Deciding to Travel in a Barrel'**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Alright just to clarify, this isn't an AU fic, it's based on all of the stuff that has happened in the anime, manga, movies, released works of Oda Eiichiro and such. I'm only exposing dark Luffy with pieces of evidence in random one-shots with hopes he wouldn't get angry and beat the cra-silence me before I finish. Luffy didn't become a smart genius in this fic, he's just very clever - you'll see as the story progresses.**

**I will continue no matter how long it takes my goal is at least 50 one-shots! (Gulp, that's a big declaration from a inconsistent , leisure writer like me…) But if I stop ... you know who to blame!**

**31 October 2013 - Happy Halloween guys! Hope you guys had a good sweets harvest or spooky fun night! This is also a birthday release hahahaha (*hint* *hint*)**

* * *

**Episode 0: Deciding to Travel in a Barrel**

"I'm the man who's gonna become the King of Pirates!" The proud declaration made from the once prideful man seemed to be _furthest _from the truth as he now lay panting in his dingy, exhausted from starvation. He had set forth from his small village a couple of days ago for his great ambition but had not encountered a single island throughout his virgin voyage. Doubtlessly due to the fact that there was no one navigating the dingy abroad, there was only one person, who was the Captain - the self-proclaimed future King of Pirates.

A loud rumbling growl can be heard from a very lean stomach as the only passenger laid flat on his back on the floorboards. "Ahhh I should get a cook for my first crew member ..."

He checked the rod stationed on the side of the small boat. "Why aren't the fish biting?" Another growl rang out as he covered his eyes from the harsh sunlight with one hand and his stomach with another. The boat suddenly trembled and shook, the rough waves splashing overboard, drenching the lone occupant.

"Woah, what's going on all of a sudden?" He snapped to awareness and looked out, lo and behold, the waves were swirling about in wide circles with a gaping vortex of 30 meters in diameter - just 300 meters away while drawing his little boat in!

He expressed his surprise once again, "Wooaaaah! What's that?" His eyes widened at the strange phenomenon before him. It seemed to suck the surrounding waters into it as it spiralled downwards.

Luffy threw a random piece of litter towards it, seeing how it quickly got swallowed by the strange current the nearer it got to the gaping hole, and disappeared into goodness-knows where, he exclaimed, "What a mysterious current!"

He decided that the current situation was his feeble boat and considered his predicament. He couldn't swim, had no immediate people around him that can and would rescue him, had an unknown amount of time before reaching an island and a mysterious current that is threatening to swallow everything within reach has already caught a hold of his boat. He had to do something on his own and fast.

All he had on his boat he was rope, barrels and a fishing rod to save his elastic but unbouyant body. _Alright, to summarize the current issues for survival, they would be: _

_1. Escape from the mysterious current (and the boat). _

_2. Survive for an indefinite amount of time while out of the boat. _

_3. Starvation and dehydration._

As he meticulously analyzed the situation, he looked at his available resources and smiled, the perfect plan came to mind.

Slotting his lower half of the body into an empty barrel, he braced his legs and hips in it. He bit on the barrel lid to leave his hands free for his genius idea.

"Gomu gomu no- ..." He then grabbed the sides of the boat with his hands, leaned back and stretched as far as possible away from it while tilting the barrel.

"-SLINGSHOT!" Letting go of the pressure against the railing of the sides, he flew through the air in an arc just as the boat started to get sucked down the throat of the mysterious current. "Woah, this is fun! Shishishishii!" He held his strawhat down with his right hand as his left held onto the lid, laughing carefreely.

A floating barrel in the middle of the ocean usually meant liberated supplies from a sunken vessel, one never knew what could be hidden in it. Both the curious and greedy would at least try fishing it out to scrutinize before deciding to open it or not. Even if they did not, the barrel would be swept up by the natural currents and wash up on an island eventually. Besides, he wouldn't have to do anything while in it and conserve his energy instead! An ultimate win-win situation indeed!

He had already spotted the solution to his predicament; there were several vessels ahead that were on the course that would reach his landing spot in an hour or so. It was almost midday now, the sailors would be resting from the heat and no one would look up to see a flying barrel (probably) and get suspicious of it.

_Better not let them get too suspicious if they look up by any chance_. He twisted and folded himself in the barrel, firmly closing the lid above him and settled down eagerly for a short nap, recharging before his next adventure starts.

_**~ To be Continued ~**_

* * *

**There you go~ Here's analytical and calm Luffy with a little of goofing around. **

**Thanks for following/favouriting!**

**Next up: Hmmm, still undecided as of now. Please feel free to suggest any themes, scenes or ideas!**


End file.
